Washington

I did a LOT of wondering in Washington. Unfortunately the main stretch between Capital Hill and the Lincoln memorial was covered in snow, and all the 'reflecting pools' were iced over. I believe its a lot prettier in other seasons.

I did a tour of the Washington Monument, Capitol Hill and the Air and Space Museum. All three were excellent. I also made it to the Lincoln Memorial, the National Botanical Garden, the Supreme Court and Arlington Cemetery.

Here's a pic of Lincoln in his chair:

Lincoln Memorial from inside the Washington Monument:

The Washington Monument:

The Capital from close up:

Inside the capital:

The Supreme Court:

And lastly (thank the lord), Arlington Cemetery:

As everything is government run here, its all free. The down side is that it all closes at 5pm. I didn't have enough time to get into the cemetery for a proper look. Apparently its really worth a wander. Next time maybe :>

Top of the Rock

I was on my own on the Monday evening, so I decided to head up to the top of Rockerfeller Centre. It probably would've been a better idea to head up when it was still light, as a lot of the landmarks were lost on me in the dark, but the view was still amazing.

As it was President's Day, the Empire State Building was lit up in blue, white and red. You'll see this in the first pic. I noticed the EY sign in the distance from a different angle - see if you can find it in the second pic :]

The oscars

I stooped to an all time low tourist level and touched a real life oscar! They had them on display at Times Square. The exhibit was free, so I figured why not :> It was a little display on how oscars were made, and if you really really wanted to, you could hold one and get your picture taken. I declined the picture :>

and a pic of Time's Square that evening...

Homebase

Located at 5 Times Square, with about 8000 employees, our homebase :]

Chinese New Year

The year of the pig. Chinatown was going absolutely crazy. The street was completely covered in chinese fireworks and everywhere you went things were exploding and colourful confetti was falling from the ski.

There were standard fireworks at Columbus Park I think it was at around 7. We were a little late unfortunately and only caught the last 5 minutes of the display. I managed to get a few pics of the evening.

Manhattan Take 2

As the weekend approached, my general health improved (yay). Akash, however, wasn't looking too great as was very much looking foward to his flight out of this freezing country. Apparently his flight was cancelled though due to bad weather and the backup from a day or two before. Jetblue, one of the local carriers, were still cancelling flights many days after the snowfall.

I discovered it was President's day on the Monday, which meant that all snowboarding packages were off for that week, and most of the resorts were filled and were charging pretty expensive rates. After doing limited research I thought I'd stay in Manhattan for the weekend, and would maybe try a day trip up to a local mountain to board.

I did the tour of Saks on 5th. With the average cost of an item in the mens section being around $500, I felt a little out of my league and just ended up taking a picture of what I wanted to buy :>

David Chu had some damn nice jersey's :>

We also checked out the National Metro Rail Museum - I think it was called. Its basically how the NY Subway was built. It was pretty dodgy looking from the outside, and was a little cold down below as its situated in an active subway station, but was definitely worth the trip. Its quite a hands on museum, and actually quite fascinating how they managed to build such a huge system under such a busy city. Here is a picture of team metro:

Snow!

On the Tuesday the snow came down. There had been quite a downfall inland, but we only had a foot or two in tarrytown. This was good news for snowboarding prospects, but as I was still getting over the tummy bag, it kept the making of snowmen and snow angels to a minimum :]

As if trying to drive on the wrong (right) hand side of the wrong wasn't hard enough, driving in snow on the wrong side is quite ridiculous. After numerous controlled skids and counter-steering manouvres - all under a limit of 25 mph, we managed to make it across the road to our client.

I just thought I'd mark our car in case we couldn't find it again when we came out.

Room Service

Well, this was a little while ago now, but what the hell :>

After that w/k in manhattan, I was laid low with a tummy bug on the monday. Must've been the -2384348 degree temperature outside and all that walking we did. I was stuck in the hotel having soup and watching cable all day, so I thought I'd splash out on some chicken wings for supper. There was no football to watch, so I had to settle for basketball instead.

NY Rangers

Had the craziest weekend in Manhattan. Its hard to believe I've only been away for a week. NY city is amazing. Just walking through the streets underneath the mile high billboards in amongst the masses of people puts you on a high.

I managed to get a team together to go to an ice hockey game on Friday night. We went to go see the NY Rangers against Tampa Bay Lightning at Madison Square Gardens (MSG). Colleagues managed to organise some tickets for around $50 right up in the top level (Mezzanine I think). I managed to leave the battery pack for my camera at the hotel, so these pics were sent through courtesy of a friend :]

This was the view from our seats. They have different types of entertainment every night at MSG. Apparently they just cover up the ice with whatever is needed eg. basketball court/stage etc.

The pic above is a little blurred, but its a slightly zoomed in pic of the game. Rangers ended up winning 5-0 I think it was. It was interesting how Tampa Bay weren't even introduced when they came onto the ice and, as they didn't score a goal, I don't think they were mentioned at all. The whole crowd stands up to sing the national anthem at the start. After every goal there's a chant for which they all stand up for and blurt out every time - which is quite amusing.

This is me and my footlong, with cheese, onions and ketchup. Damn it was good :]

Arrived in the dark, left in the dark. That was our work day yesterday. We ended up veg'ing at the hotel last night. They have a few places to eat downstairs which, even though they are generally expensive, have pizzas which aren't all that bad. There's also a jacuzzi and a heated pool in the indoor courtyard.

Took the worst pic ever - yet another of the car park in the background. Hopefully we'll get to see some more exciting places this weekend.

That's me with my chubby cheeks, new coat and cheesy smile. Actually its a bit of a nervous smile. Been checking out accomodation prices, and this touring/snowboarding week I'm spending in the states is looking pretty darn expensive!

9 Farenheit

My list of purchased goods to date:

• NFL Cap
• Yankees boxers
• CK Overcoat

That about covers my allowance for the next few days. We visited another shopping centre last night - Westchester Mall - and ended up eating at 'Master Wok'. As we were walking past, the server stuck out a few toothpicks with samples, and after about 4 of these I think we felt too guilty to just move on. Here's a pic of akash and his rather oily looking dish.

The temperature outside at the moment is about 9 farenheit, and the wind chill brings that down to around -15. Now that in celcius, is about -26...

So we landed in NY city yesterday morning. We spent the day driving through to Tarrytown (Up-state NY), getting ourselves setup in our hotel, and then shopping at the Palisades - which is a local shopping centre. I don't have time to go into much detail at the moment, but here are some pretty lame pics so far :>

The pic above is a view from our office. Its MAD cold outside. Apparently the high's for the rest of the week are all going to be below freezing.

This is a pic from Oliver Tambo's international Out of Africa shop. Eeek. Boss calling. brb